Solano County Fair, yay!

We all know the typical happenings at the fair, whether it be the rides, games, food or barnyard animals—we know what to expect, and that’s fine! I had a blast. I was actually at the fair every single day—EVERY. SINGLE. DAY!—performing improv with the Rats in the Alley. The Solano County Arts Council & Creative Arts Consortium collected all sorts of artists from around the county to perform in the “Fine Arts & Flowers” building by the children’s area. For the shows our slogan was: “Come for the flowers, stay for the improv.”

Meandering about I noticed something rather exciting: A robot! A real-life artificial being! (real + artificial / same sentence = oxymoron?) The bot would roll around greeting people as they approached. Kids would ask it questions and it talked back with relevant answers! I knew something had to be up:

Turns out the man in the back, trying to get out of the picture frame, was controlling the robot from his waistpack and the straw in his beverage cup was concealing a microphone! Brilliant!

After speaking with Dale (the mysterious controller man, also a representative from Atlas Robotics in Santa Rosa) I learned that his robot was actually quite friendly—it even asked me for a hug!

I think I made the robot blush. Can't you tell???

Meandering elsewhere I came across a tank; the last thing I expected to see written on it was Solano County Anything, and yet, there it was:

DON'T MESS WITH SOLANO COUNTY! OR the sheriff. WOW, can you imagine? That's quite a threat being able to tell someone, "If you break the law I'll either arrest you, or shoot you and investigate your body myself." That's ... quite a threat, indeed: Stanton rules!

Then my friend and fellow Rats in the Alley trouper Stewart Evan Smith walked up to the tank and said: “You don’t look so tough!” The tank had news for Stew: